Far from home: A Chilean foreign exchange student's experience in Humboldt County

At 17 years old, Eureka High School senior Carlos Miranda is probably more patriotic than many American teenagers.

He has a Chilean flag hanging over his bed in his host family's house in Eureka and much of his clothing has "Chile" written on it.

"Viva Chile," the soft-spoken teenager likes to say, and sometimes write on his Facebook profile.

An AFS Intercultural Programs exchange student from a northern Chile city called Calama, Miranda undoubtedly loves his country, but he decided to spend his last year of high school as a student in the United States in order to improve his English language skills and meet new people.

But he is also acting as an ambassador of sorts for his country, even bringing a CD with a promotional video about Chile and its tourist attractions.

"He's very proud of his country," said Miranda's host father Russ Turpin, a teacher at Eureka High. Turpin and his wife, Wendy Riggs, set the table for dinner as Miranda surfed the net.

As he got to the table, the couple's sons Keenan, 3, and Kai, 2, repeatedly invited Miranda to sit in between them.

"They love Carlos," Riggs said.

It was Riggs who had found the ad on Craigslist.org looking for host families and thought it would be a great opportunity to learn about another culture. She said she was hoping that her sons would be able to pick up the Spanish language.

Miranda's family in Calama consists of his father, a machine supervisor for a copper mine; his mother, a stay-at-home mom; and an older sister, who is studying at a university in Chile.

He said he has been studying English for 12 years, but he wants to be able to expand his vocabulary and learn slang words.

In Chile, he said, it is usually just the privileged who get to learn English.

According to its Web site, AFS Intercultural Programs is one of the world's largest not-for-profit volunteer-based organizations. It offers international exchange programs in more than 50 countries through local AFS organizations, each with a network of volunteers, a professionally staffed office and a volunteer board. More than 300,000 students and adults have been exchanged since 1946.

Miranda spent one weekend in October in an orientation with his fellow exchange students. The students discussed their experiences so far, and volunteers went over problem-solving skills to ensure that students will adjust comfortably to their new environments. The students also went over dealing with stereotypes -- assumptions some people may have about their countries and that they may have about Americans.

A girl from Italy said people have asked her if she eats pasta for all her meals, and a girl from Germany said she gets asked if everyone in Germany wears bikinis, or ever puts on deodorant.

Having been here a little more than two months, Miranda seems to be adjusting easily enough.

He plays on the school's junior varsity soccer team, and as the only male exchange student at Eureka High, he'll be escorting the foreign exchange student club's Homecoming Queen nominee to the dance later this week.

In school he's taking U.S. history, speech, chemistry, algebra and German, which he said is very manageable compared to the 12 classes a day he had to take in Calama.

"Here, it's very relaxed," he said.

Miranda said Humboldt's climate is different from Chile's northern Atacama Desert, the region he calls home.

"A lot of desert, but it's very beautiful too, very dry," he said, adding that it gets cold, but it's a dry cold compared with Humboldt County's humidity.

Miranda said it only rains three days out of the year in the desert, and he's been told he's in for a change in Humboldt, where the winter season is usually steeped in rainy days.

Another difference Miranda has noticed is how much less active the youth here seem to be.

"It is so quiet here," he said about the neighborhood streets. "In Chile we have kids in the streets playing soccer."

But there are similarities, too, he said.

Miranda said his host family is not too different from his real family back home.

Riggs and Turpin have already taken Miranda on a camping trip to Montana, where he was able to meet Riggs' family. Miranda said he saw bears and turkeys for the first time.

"The Montana chaos," they call the trip.

Riggs said Miranda helps around the house without asking.

Every morning, Miranda wakes up in time to help Keenan get ready, and the two of them have breakfast together, before Riggs and Kai wake up. The two boys like to watch Miranda leave for school and waves goodbye to him.

While he has made good friends with other exchange students, several of his closer friends, including the Spanish-speaking ones, are in other places like Weaverville and Redding. He said he misses being able to communicate in his native tongue.

"I miss Chilean Spanish," he said.

But he said he is hopeful he will make new friends and that he will have a better grasp of the language very soon.

"Carlos is not afraid," Turpin said. "He is not a timid person. If he was, he wouldn't be here."

Miranda and his host family seem to have grown very close in their short time together. His host mom teases him about his aversion to cats. The family has a pet cat, Lois, who slinks around Miranda while he's on the computer. They share inside jokes about Miranda's pet dog, Tommy, back in Chile.

When he speaks on the phone with his family in Chile, Miranda lets Riggs get a "Hola!" into the conversation.

Riggs said she feels like Miranda's family is a part of her family now.

"I got to go hug his mom," she said, adding that she is planning to visit someday.

"No problem," Miranda responds. "I will translate."

As the family prepares to eat their meal together, they hold hands and say grace for all the things they are grateful for. Keenan and Kai go down the list: dinner, cookies, salmon -- and then Kai adds, "Thanks for Carlos."